ISSUE: Spring/Summer 2023
on a movie set and you see the doctor
who appears to have been hired
to provide first aid for any cut or scrape
an actor might meet with. You know
he’s a doctor not by a white coat,
stethoscope, or head-mirror reflector
on his forehead, but because earlier
you overheard somebody ask,
Who’s that? At that, the person
to whom the question was addressed
had turned and said, He’s the on-set
doctor. You too had looked
in the direction the first was looking.
You’d noticed the doctor was handsome
and as soon as you did, you’d sensed
you had seen him before.
The feeling wasn’t pleasant.
You could even say it was painful. A pain
the size of a toy dog left on a rowboat
adrift in a mist. You saw through the fog
and remembered a moment when
you were very young and a doctor said
you should imagine pain as a number
between one and ten. You now wonder
how he knew you could count.
With the question of counting,
you recall a rhyme: One for sorrow, /
Two for joy, / Three for a girl, /
Four for a boy, / Five for silver, /
Six for gold, / Seven, for a secret
you never told. The director yells, Cut!
You didn’t know the filming had begun.
